September 2005

Is It Gouging for Politicians to Charge $1000 for a Meal?

Michael Giberson The Associated Press carried the following news item on efforts to prohibit gasoline price gouging: Northwest Senators Aim To Prohibit Gasoline Price GougingPOSTED: 1:30 pm PDTSeptember 21, 2005 WASHINGTON — Two Northwest senators, Republican Gordon Smith of Oregon and Democrat Maria Cantwell of Washington, have introduced legislation to prohibit gasoline price gouging during …

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Governors Pile on the “Price Gouging” Bandwagon

Lynne Kiesling Many thanks to jeffrey.d for alerting me to the letter signed by eight governors asking for a federal gasoline pricing probe, and possible refunds of “excess profits” (remind me to add that to the list of economic non-concepts, right behind “price gouging” and “windfall profits”). The WaPo article mentions a study by Don …

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The Porkbusters Idea Gathers Speed

Lynne Kiesling This morning the Wall Street Journal editorialized about the Porkbusters idea, even going so far as to print the web address at The Truth Laid Bear. Transparency and accountability. If they refuse to do it themselves, we use highly distributed technology to make them. Beautiful.

Windfall Profits? Spare Me

Lynne Kiesling Like “price gouging”, “windfall profits” is an economic non-concept that rears its ugly head in the political machinations surrounding exogenous economic dislocations like national disasters. Senators Cantwell and Dorgan, who are sensible on some other, electricity-related, energy issues, really get it wrong here. Steve Chapman’s column on the topic points out the economic …

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